How to Install Add-ons & Extend Plone Functionality With Add-on Packages?
What is an Add-on Package?
An add-on package in Plone helps to extend the functionality of Plone by installing the add-on package. There are more than 2,000 add-ons available for Plone, and using the correct add-on for any Plone project will help to save a lot of time. But finding the correct Plone add-ons will take time because most of them might have version dependencies issues. This might occur due to the development of that add-on that might have dropped and might be developed for an earlier version of Plone; for that, we should always check the version change logs, and it’s a supported version of Plone. This is available on the pypi.org.
Most Popular Add-ons
Collective.easyform
Easyform, a form generator helps to create forms.
Plone.app.mosaic
Layout solution to easily create complex layouts through the web. Helps to place images and texts as blocks.
The insert menu
Collective.geo
Flexible bundle of add-ons to geo-reference content and display in maps
Collective.mailchimp
Allows visitors to subscribe to mailchimp newsletters
Eea.facetednavigation
Create faceted navigation and searches through the web.
Collective.lineage
Microsites for Plone – makes subfolders appear to be autonomous Plone sites
Collective.behavior.banner
Add decorative banners and sliders.
How to find add-ons
Finding the proper add-on for your needs can be very difficult. Here are a few tips:
List the features that are necessary. The perfect add-on for your needs is rarely available.
Either adjust your needs to fit what is available, spend the time & money to alter an existing add-on to meet your needs, or develop a new add-on that performs your specific requirements.
After you have all the requirements search in the following link below:
https://plone.org/download/add-ons
https://pypi.org (Search for Plone-related packages )
The Plone add-ons are distributed as python modules, also known as eggs.
The mighty buildout.cfg file in the Plone configuration defines which add-ons are available to install in the Site Setup > Add-ons control panel, the command bin/buildout in the Plone directory reads the buildout.cfg file and automatically downloads the required packages to run the add-on, there is no need to manually download and configure the Plone add-ons manually The PyPi Python package repository hosts add-on file downloads in addition to a large number of other Python software modules.
Even though they are Python eggs, Plone add-ons must be installed using buildout because no other methods will update the configuration files to reflect recently downloaded and installed eggs. For Plone add-ons, alternative Python installation techniques such as easy install and pip are not applicable.
Installing Add-ons in Plone 5.2
For installing an add-on in Plone, we need to make the add-on package available for Zope. Thus zope can import the code, this can be done by the Buildout,
In buildout.cfg In the section [instance] there is a variable called eggs, which has a list of eggs as a value. For example,
eggs =
Plone
collective.easyformBy adding a line in this refers, this section refers to that you’ve added an egg (python package/add-on name).
The egg name must be intended, and then only the buildout understands that the current line is part of the last variable and not a new variable.
After adding the new add-ons, you will have to run the buildout and restart the site:
bin/buildout
bin/instance fgAs this addon is new to the Plone instance, it’s better to start as foreground, so we can see the current running log if there are any error or compatibility issues.
Installing addons to your Plone site
We have only made the package available to Plone to you the specific add-on you must enable in the Plone site in which you wish to install,
Step 1: Go to site setup
Step 2: Under general, go to Add-ons
Step 3: Install the add-on in the Plone site
The installation of add-ons is completed and it will be available on the Plone site use.